


18/09/25: beginning of an end

by excelsi_or



Series: to a boy i love right now [52]
Category: SEVENTEEN (Band)
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Marriage Proposal
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-17
Updated: 2020-07-17
Packaged: 2021-03-05 00:08:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,154
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25341469
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/excelsi_or/pseuds/excelsi_or
Summary: People keep mentioning marriage. It's making Jihoon think about it a little differently.
Relationships: Lee Jihoon | Woozi/Original Female Character(s)
Series: to a boy i love right now [52]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1252010
Comments: 4
Kudos: 23





	18/09/25: beginning of an end

_September 18, 2025_

“You want to _what now_?”

“Knew I should have called Wonwoo,” Jihoon sighs. He twirls his pencil between his fingers.

“ _No_ , calling your _best friend_ is the ideal person to call in this situation.”

“My best friend is an idiot and blowing it _out of proportion_ ,” Jihoon retorts.

Mingyu huffs. “You call me, asking how to propose. WHAT DO YOU EXPECT ME TO DO?”

Jihoon frowns at his phone screen and then puts it back to his ear. “ _Not_ yell at me, you absolute dolt. I just want advice on what to say and how to do it. Rings and stuff.”

“I am literally the most ill-equipped person for this conversation,” Mingyu whines. He clicks his tongue. “Let’s go talk to Seungcheollie hyung tonight.”

Considering Seungcheol isn’t married, Jihoon wonders why Mingyu thinks the older man would be helpful. “But why do you need to come?”

“I need to be prepared for your upcoming nuptials.”

Jihoon tries to fight the smile that blooms on his face when he hears those words. “Shut up.”

“I never thought I would see the day, hyung.”

“I’m really going to hang up on you.”

“Text Cheol hyung and then text me.” Mingyu sounds as if he’s going to say goodbye. “Don’t you dare leave me out of this, hyung. I swear to God.” Then the line goes dead.

Jihoon twirls around in his seat.

The break up songs that one of the managers had liked just weren’t the types of songs he was making nowadays. So he handed the man ballads, sadder songs about love. They were more longing than angsty. And while it doesn’t seem to be exactly what the man had heard, he seemed happy with the end result.

“Ah, you’re a good one, Jihoon-ssi,” he’d said.

Jihoon knows that he can’t do much better than that in terms of a compliment. But it didn’t take a genius to know that Jihoon’s head hasn't been entirely on music the past few weeks.

The company had had a party a few nights ago to celebrate the end of summer. This meant that significant others and spouses were able to mingle alongside them. While it was nice to introduce her to some of the other producers, she knew Hansol, Seokmin, and Bumzu already. They were the only real people that mattered to him.

Regardless, since then, people have been passing him in the hallway asking when he plans to tie the knot.

“You don’t let a smart woman like that walk around without a ring on her finger, Jihoon-ah,” one of the higher ups had said. She’d wanted a drink and Jihoon had offered to grab it for her. If she had heard that man, she would have given him a piece of her mind. Something along the lines of ownership and how she, as a smart woman, can do whatever she wants with or without a ring.

But odd comments like that have had him looking at marriage differently.

His mother, in particular, has been pushing the marriage card a bit harder than usual. Every time Jihoon calls, she asks why he hasn’t asked that ‘poor girl to marry him’.

“We’re just not ready yet,” Jihoon says every time.

“Aish,” his mother sighs. “When are you going to be ready?”

“What’s the difference if we’re married? We’d be living the same life we do now.”

“It feels different when you’re married, Jihoon-ah.”

When he wakes up next to her in the morning, he’s started wondering how different it would feel.

“What do you think of marriage?” Jihoon asked one morning at breakfast. They were sat across each other on their kitchen counters with bowls of cereal in their laps.

“Marriage?” she repeated. She tipped her head in that way of hers. “We said we’d get married when we were ready.”

Jihoon nodded. They’ve been saying it for years now. When they’re ready. “Are we?”

“Ready for marriage?” She looked at him with wide eyes. “Are _you_ ready for marriage?”

“Are you?”

She chewed thoughtfully, tipping her head back. “Jihoonie, if you asked me to marry you, I’d be stupid to say no. But how different would our lives be if we tied the knot?”

“I don’t know." He shrugged. "Omma says it’s different.”

She had no response to that, but that was an affirmative answer as any. The topic of marriage usually put them off completely and made them scared for what the future held. But Jihoon has been analyzing his future before bed every night, as she lays in his arms already asleep.

She’s it. Every future he can come up with has her in it.

And maybe that’s what makes him ready.

Jihoon digs around in his pocket for the ring box that he’s been carrying for a few weeks. He’d picked it out, checked her shoe for her shoe size and sized the ring to it. If the Internet was lying about that, they can always get it resized. He keeps the ring box in his backpack and sweater pockets when he leaves the house. She’ll find it if he leaves it at home.

The call to Mingyu was to prep him. And because he also knows his friend is horrible at keeping it secrets, everyone else will know by the time they get home. It’s a sort of incentive to ask her now before the surprise is spoiled.

His phone rings and he answers on the first ring when he sees her name. “Hello?”

“Can you still get away for a quick dinner?”

“Yeah, I’ll meet you by the Han.”

“You’ve already ordered our foods, yes?”

“The Cokes and chicken should be there when you get there,” Jihoon chuckles. He’d ordered before calling Mingyu. “See you in a bit.”

“Love you.”

“Love you too.” As soon as he’s hung up, he hops out of his chair, makes sure he has everything and hurries out of the building. It isn’t until he’s in the lobby that he realizes that the ring isn’t in his sweater pocket. Quickly, Jihoon bolts back upstairs, past four people he already said bye to and passes those same four people again on his way down.

Jihoon catches the train. He’s bouncing on the balls of his feet the entire way, the anticipation killing him. He didn’t expect to be nervous. He planned this entire thing so that it would be a nonchalant ask. It would come up mid-conversation and she could say yes or no. If she wasn’t ready, cool. If she was, great. He didn’t want to add extra pressure by dressing up fancy and going to a nice restaurant, which they never do; or picking an important date to ask, in case it went wrong.

And yet, he’s still nervous to ask the love of his life if she wants to spend the rest of her life with him. Go figure.

Jihoon, even after running up and down the stairs twice, makes it to the Han before she does. The delivery boy arrives right on time and Jihoon pays him, tips him, and then sits down and waits. Jihoon flicks through a Webtoon he’s been reading in the mean time and glances up every time he thinks he hears her coming.

Jihoon doesn’t bother to look up when he hears jogging footsteps coming towards him until those footsteps stop right beside him. He looks up at her in a yellow dress and one of his cardigans over it, because it’s starting to get cold. Her hair seems wind swept and her cheeks are flushed.

“Train got delayed for a kid who got lost,” she breathes. She takes a seat next to the food, turned so that she’s facing him entirely and her legs are crossed. “Let’s eat.”

Jihoon can’t seem to say anything. He’s at a loss and every time he tries to say something, he has to bite his tongue. The words ‘do you want to marry me’ seem to want to just fall out of his mouth. So he stays mum.

She must assume that he’s just in the middle of a creative whirl, as she talks for the both of them. She updates him on what she’s been up to at work, on the articles she’s read that day, on the little squabbles between their friends.

“Seungkwan told me that he thinks Hansol is dating somebody, because he stays out late and sometimes texts him that he isn’t coming home.”

Jihoon smirks.

“And I know it’s because he’s prepping to drop his next album and that he doesn’t want to tell Seungkwan until then,” she chuckles. “So I just went along with it.”

She chews thoughtfully and stares out at the River, admiring the lights across the water as it gets dark. “You okay, Ji?”

Jihoon tips his head. He hasn’t taken his eyes off her since she sat down.

“You literally haven’t said anything since I got here.” She turns back to him. “Something on your mind?”

Jihoon is about to shake his head no, when he feels the weight of the ring box shift against his skin. “Yeah, actually.”

She lifts an eyebrow, popping another chicken piece into her mouth. “What is it?”

Jihoon licks his bottom lip and thinks about how he wants to word this. “Remember that conversation we had a few weeks ago?”

She stares at him blankly.

“At breakfast," he clears his throat, "about marriage.”

“Oh.” She nods. “Yeah, I do.”

His mouth feels dry. “Have you thought about it since?”

“Marriage?” She shrugs. Her eyes fall to the food between them. “I told you I’d be stupid to say no, I think. All you have to do is ask, Jihoonie, I’ll say—”

He had slipped his hand into his sweater pocket while she was looking at the food. When she sits back, the ring box is open between them.

“Whoa,” she finishes. Her eyes meet his.

Jihoon shrugs sheepishly. “Will you marry me?”

Her eyes have grown to the size of saucers. There's just a long enough pause that Jihoon starts to pull the ring box back. “ _Yes_ , Jihoon. Yeah. Oh my god.” She watches as he slips the ring on her finger.

Before she has time to process all her emotions, Jihoon says, “Hah, the Internet was right.”

The bubbling of emotion, and probably tears, pops as her brow furrows. She pulls her gaze from the ring to look at him. “What?”

Jihoon explains the shoe size-ring size article he’d read. “Didn’t believe it, But I’m glad it’s right otherwise this would be a little anticlimactic. Are you surprised?”

“About the ring fitting or the proposal?” When she looks to him, her eyes are sparkling. “I’m surprised. You’d been mentioning marriage more often lately, especially since that company thing a few days ago. So I guess I was also… expecting something.” She lets out a breath, something between a laugh and a sigh. "Can't say I was expecting a full-on proposal. Maybe another conversation about marriage."

Jihoon takes her hand and brushes a kiss to the back of it. “If I did this any other time, I’m almost sure that everyone else would know I was going to ask.”

“You haven’t told the guys?”

Jihoon shakes his head. “But I assume they all know about a pending engagement by now.”

She laughs, unable to tame her smile or the euphoria in her chest. “You told Gyu, didn’t you?”

He smirks.

“You’re not actually going back to the office, are you? You’re not going to make me wait to actually tell them, are you? Hansol and Seungkwanie are coming over for games tonight.”

Jihoon chuckles and he squeezes her hand. “I’m all yours tonight.”

She uses her other hand to feed him a piece of chicken. “Now that’s what I like to hear.”

“You guys all have to be out of here by midnight,” she announces once the boys are all seated in the living room.

Jihoon glances over at her from his spot on the couch, laughing.

She brings the snacks to the table as the boys ask why.

“I _told you_!” Seungkwan exclaims, grabbing her wrist. “He’d do it without telling us!”

Then he pulls her left hand into the center of the room for everyone to see the ring on her finger. The reaction is almost immediate. Jihoon is yanked in what seems like three directions.

Seungkwan pulls her into his lap for a hug, and Jeonghan leans closer so they can discuss the ring.

“And here I thought you were letting me in on a secret!” Mingyu whines as he ruffles Jihoon’s hair.

“The secret that he knew you were going to spread to all of us,” Wonwoo chuckles from Mingyu’s other side.

Jihoon catches her eye across the room and she can’t help but smile.

Yep, that flip in his stomach is all the answer he needs.

He’s ready.

**Author's Note:**

> GUYS, WE'VE MADE IT TO THE END! :D
> 
> Thank you to everyone who's read this series and to those who have religiously been reading and giving kudos. I see you guys and thoroughly appreciate you <3 
> 
> I am poTENTIALLY illustrating parts of the story, but I've only just started. I'll post the first couple pages here if I ever get around to it, haha. :) 
> 
> I have another Jihoon story that I finished earlier this year that I've started editing. So maybe first week of August? I'll be back? Hahaha, anyway, thank you again to all of you who've made it this far! xx I'm currently posting this series on tumblr (find me @excelsi-or there) and am only about halfway through the story there. But come chat if you'd like. :D


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